LINKS TO THE PORT MANTEAU OF HORROR

Sunday, September 10, 2017

In 1985, Lamberto Bava and Dario
Argento introduced the world to the reality of Demons. That film
delivered fun and frights in an overly gory film that has become a
cult favorite. They wasted no time in following that success with the
equally crazy and perhaps even more unglued sequel in 1986 with
Demons 2. Clearly they did not want to let up the momentum but also
did not have a unified creative direction as to where to take the
series, so in 1989 The Church (aka La Chiesa) was released and is
often considered Demons 3, despite the lack of direct connection. Of
course, it is one of three films to be referred to as Demons 3. If
there is one thing fun about Italian horror, it is navigating the web
of alternate titles.

Seriously, there are so many alternate
titles and movie series that aren’t movie series that it is hard to
keep up. For example, take Zombie, it is also known as Zombi 2. You
see, in Italy, Dawn of the Dead was released as Zombi and this was
released to try to capitalize on that. There is also Zombie 3, Zombie
4: The Killing Birds, and Zombie 5: After Death. None of them are
related and the last 2 just had the name tacked on for marketing
purposes. The same thing happened with the Demons series. Lamberto
Bava and Dardano Sachetti made a TV movie called The Ogre, which is
sometimes called Demons 3, and Umberto Lenzi made a film called Black
Demons, which was retitled Demons 3 for video release. Then there is
Michele Soavi’s 1991 film, La Sette, which is called Demons 4, and
his 1994 film, Cemetery Man, called Demons ‘95. Can’t keep them
straight, and thematically there is little to connect them to each
other.

The Church was originally intended to
be officially titled Demons 3. The problem was that director and
co-writer (and frequent Argento collaborator) Michele Soavi (who
appeared in the first Demons film, in 2 roles!), wanted the film to
stand on its own separate from the series. This meant that any
references to prior events was rewritten out of the film. Although,
despite not being credited, Lamberto Bava and Dardano Sachetti did
work on the script alongside Soavi, Argento, and Franco Ferrini. The
movie does have more plot and flows in a more restrained manner than
the prior Demons films, but there could still be a connection between
the films.

Our story begins in the past, a band of
Teutonic knights are led to a village of supposed devil worshippers.
They proceed to slaughter the village and bury them in a mass grave.
The pit is covered, blessed, and sealed with a cross. The only
possible survivor is a young girl (Asia Argento) who watches from the
nearby trees. She is spotted by a knight, who chases her down. We
watch as he thrusts with his spear, but we never see the girl killed.

Jumping to the present, a gothic
cathedral has been built over the mass grave, the cross seal being in
the basement. Everything has been fine as the seal remains
undisturbed and tucked away from prying eyes, but that is about to
change. A new librarian, Evan (Tomas Arana, The Last Temptation of
Christ) arrives at the church, hired to catalog all of the old books
in the library. He joins a young woman, Lisa (Barbara Cupisti, New
York Ripper), who is working on restoring the paintings. There are
others around, Father Gus (Hugh Quarshie, Star Wars Episode I: The
Phantom Menace), an old bishop, the sacristan and his daughter, Lotte
(Asia

Argento). On top of those, you have a
wide variety of victims to be wandering the church.

Of course, the seal is discovered. As
Evan tries to figure out its purpose, it breaks open releasing the
hell that has been kept trapped beneath for hundreds of years. This
triggers a lockdown of the cathedral, trapping everyone inside. The
demonic infestation begins to spread and infect everyone. People
begin to act strange, see demons begin to infect all of those in the
church. This leaves Father Gus to follow up on the revelation that
the cathedral can be brought down to stop the spread of evil.

The latter half of the film splits its
time between between batsh*t crazy demons, kills, rape, and
sacrifice, while the more serious portion involves trying to survive
and bring the cathedral down to stop the demons. It is artful,
cheesy, and so very entertaining. Then, much like the two official
Demons films, ends on a note that is open to interpretation and could
be seen as bleak and foreboding, but at the same time it is strangely
comforting.

Taking the film on its own merits, as
Soavi intended, is a rewarding experience. There really is a lot to
like here and it doesn’t need the influence of any other films to
give it a sense of worth, on that level Soavi succeeded. It presents
a compelling story all on its own, involving the sins of past being
unleashed on the present and relying on the altruism of the hero,
although his role is not immediately seen, to save the day, or at
least as much of it as he can.

The Church is not all about visceral
reactions, it has that story of the knights and the evi and how its
been trapped. Still, when it comes to the guts and gore, it delivers
the goods. There are impalings, decapitations, clawing, even getting
smashed on the front of a train. This is a move to enjoy, whether you
want to watch for the horror aspects, the story parts, or something
in between.

The fun comes in if you want to tie it
to the mythology of the two demons films cialis online. On the surface, they appear
to be unrelated, and that is by design, but the good thing about the
franchise is that through two films it continues to reinvent itself
and change the rules. It is a franchise that is not afraid to shake
itself up a little bit and play with the reality it is creating and
reshaping. It is because of this that you can still work The Church
in. It doesn’t hurt that a lot of those involved with the initial
Demons outings have their voices involved here.

I look at this film as something of a
prequel to Demons. I see this world as having a number of portal
possibilities between our reality and the demon reality and the
burying of the evil by the knights weakened the barrier between
worlds, the seal creating a tenuous wall holding the evil back. Once
broken, they gateway was opened and the evil flowed into our world.

Now, you have to ask, if it is the same
universe, why don’t they look at least similar? I suspect the demon
world has multiple types of demons and the ones congregated around
this gateway are this type, while the ones on those other films are a
different breed, if you will. I know it is a stretch, but we are
talking about linking demonic movies into one universe, there is
going to be a little stretching going on.

It is a prequel because I see these
events happening before the events of Demons. As this film ends we
watch Lotte climb into the ruins and see a blue glow from the gate
and her smiling. To me this says the collapsing of the cathedral did
not seal the gate, just slowed their process. This results in Lotte
becoming a demonic envoy, working from this side of the gate. She
probably encounters the man with the metal face seen in Demons. Of
course, this would be some point later and she is grown up and he is
not yet masked. She enlists him to help open the gates and they
encounter the new type of demons and set up the Metropol trap.

I don’t know, perhaps I am reaching.
Perhaps I am stretching too far and the tenuous connection has
snapped under my revisionist views on how they connect. Still, it is
interesting to contemplate what might have been and what could be,
and also try to apply logic in the absence thereof. Don’t you
think?